NOTES ON THE RURAL ECONOMY OF THE ITALIAN 



FENIiNSULA. 



[By the Hon. N. Burchard, late Consul near the Swiss Confederation.] 



On crossing the Alpine regions, either through the Swiss or 

 German passes, the traveler is pleased with the beauty and variety 

 of the Italian landscape, which here and there shows mountains that 

 shoot up into the regions of eternal frosts, and ever and anon are 

 clad with stately forests, or green meadows and cornfields, and are 

 over the furnace of the liquid fires whose overllow is more terrific 

 than the rolling mass of snow from the icy pinnacles of the Yung 

 fraw. Italy, which extends from the iron bound coast of Calabria 

 to the frozen wall of the north, gives every variety of climate, 

 production and soil. The Alps shelter it from the cold piercing 

 winds that blow over Germany, and the Appenines soften the 

 hot sirocco that sweeps across the arid sands of Africa. These long 

 and lofty mountains are the water-sheet, that coasts the direction 

 of those magnificent rivers that flow into the German ocean and 

 the Mediterranean sea or its dependencies. But of all the rivers 

 that wash this highly favored clime, none exceeds the basin of 

 the Po, either for capacity, or excels it in fertility and culture. 

 No winter is here felt, save in the high regions, and intertropical 

 fruits are grown in sight of eternal snows. What prospect can be 

 more enchanting than a sail on Lake Como, with the hoary Alps 

 in the back ground, whose tall peaks pierce beyond the clouds, 

 and the smiling hamlets, villas and cities which lie towards the 

 south, embosomed in vineyards, oranges and evergreens. But this 

 is not the natural region of the vine, though introduced here 

 with the olive before the Christian era, by a Grecian colony. 

 The vintage is abundant, but through all the peninsula the grape 

 climbs the topmost branches of the elm and other trees. Though 

 this culture may please the eye with the luscious clusters hanging 

 down in graceful festoons over walks, yet the raisin loses in 

 sweetness and flavor. There is scarcely a vineyard in Northern 



